L-M School Shows Higher Test Scores

A year ago the Laurens-Marathon school was declared to be "in need of assistance" under the federal No Child Left Behind law. This year the school has fared better.

The Iowa Department of Education released its annual list of schools this week. If schools do not meet an ever-rising set of standards in graduation rates, reading and math scores, and attendance, they can be added to the list. The L-M elementary and middle schools were added last year because they had not made so-called adequate yearly progress in reading scores for two consecutive years.

But this year they did raise those standardized test scores. If L-M scores high enough again next year they will escape the list. A third of Iowa schools are on the list. More get added every year. Ultimately all schools will be on the list because the standards are higher every year. The 2014 standards set by the federal NCLB law are widely considered unattainable. The law has caused considerable anxiety among educators and has boosted the standing of private schools who are not governed by the law.

Arrested Leaving Laurens

One cold January night a young man left Laurens with a small amount of marijuana hidden in his car. He drove straight into the hands of the law. On May 24 he was sentenced to six months in the county jail. The sentence was suspended and replaced with probation.

He is 18-year-old Kevin Bergen of Albert City. He was stopped by sheriff deputy Brian Runneberg. According to court papers Runneberg pulled Bergen over as he was turning from N-28 toward Albert City because Runneberg "recognized the vehicle and had knowledge that the plates were expired." Deputy Runneberg also reported Bergen's car "has been parked at a known house in Laurens with drug activity."

Runneberg asked permission to search Bergen's car but Bergen initially declined, according to Runneberg's report of the incident. Later Bergen agreed to a search. Runneberg found no contraband. Nevertheless he impounded the car, telling Bergen "that since the vehicle wasn't registered to him and had no proof of insurance and expired plates that the vehicle was going to be towed." Later a dog found a "small" amount of marijuana in the air vent of the car.

Bergen's driver's license was suspended after his guilty plea to the misdemeanor crime of possession of marijuana. He has been ordered to pay court costs and to accept treatment from Community and Family Resources of Fort Dodge.

Iowa's court system spends about a million dollars a week on marijuana cases. An estimated 20% of young Iowa adults use marijuana every year.

Political Lines Redrawn Around Laurens

Proposed new legislative lines give Laurens two Congressmen, two state representatives and a new state senator. Someone will get forced out! The lines were drawn to reflect the census of 2010. All legislative districts must be the same size.

The new Iowa 10th House District would include Pocahontas, Humboldt, Calhoun and parts of Webster counties. Two Republican members of the current Iowa House--Tom Shaw and David Tjepkes--live in opposite corners of the district.

Our proposed new state senate district will include all the same areas plus most of Webster county. Fort Dodge Democrat Daryl Beall would be our state senator until the next senate election.

Pocahontas county is the virtual heart of the proposed Fourth Congressional District. It reaches from Missouri Valley to Carroll to Ames to New Hampton, including everything to the northwest. Republican incumbents Tom Latham and Steve King both live in this district.

The state legislature must approve or reject this map by the end of April. Current office holders will remain in place until the 2012 elections.

Joelson Calls Community Pow-Wow

The L-M school superintendent wants to talk. He has invited the community to a meeting two weeks from today. The topic for the 6:30 p.m. session will be "What does it mean to be an educated adult in Lauren-Marathon in the 21st century?"

Superintendent Iner Joelson issued the invitation in the school's current "Update" publication, a blue booklet that arrived in area mailboxes last week. He reports that school board members recently read The Global Achievement Gap (available on Kindle even!) and want to re-invent the public school, not just "reform" it. He says "we need your help" because "while [the board] focused on the urgency of change, we had great difficulty . . .in defining a specific area to address."

Joelson also referred his readers to a new website that was "formed to help Iowan's find a common voice to promote the need for innovation in education."

Last year the L-M school was called a "school in need of assistance" by the federal government. The No Child Left Behind Act(NCLB) is slowly bearing down on all public schools. It expects all students to be on grade level by 2014. Schools that don't appear on track to meet that goal will be penalized. However the NCLB law is due for re-authorization this year.

Meanwhile the Iowa House wants to cut state aid to education.

New Rural Atlas Tells Our Tale

A new on-line atlas from the US Dept of Agriculture has just been posted. It tells many figures about Pocahontas County. Here are a few:

--We had a 10.5% poverty rate in 2009.

--We were 38% employed in services; 19% in manufacturing; 13% in agriculture.

--Nearly 10% of us lack a high school diploma(see poverty rate above but don't jump to conclusions); 28% have a college diploma.

--We had 806 farms in 2007, but a quarter of them had less than $10,000 in sales.

--Only 28% of farm operators work off the farm. Only 1% sell food directly for human consumption.

The new website is a map. Roll your cursor over the county of your choice and read all about it. How does Pocahontas compare to where your relatives live? Why don't they move here?

Laurens Shrinks As Fast As County

The Laurens population fell from 1476 in the 2000 census to only 1258 this time, a drop of nearly 15%. That virtually matches the county decline of 15.6%. In the previous decade the city had declined only 5% while the county shed residents nearly twice as fast. The census reports 106 vacant housing units in Laurens, a vacancy rate of 15% Why can't we escape that number of 15%?

Havelock has 138 residents, down from 177 or 22%. Pocahontas fell 9% to 1789.

Marathon has 237 in the current census, down 22% from 2000. Albert City has 699, down only ten residents from the last census. All the 2010 numbers are at this website.

State Grows But County Shrinks

Pocahontas County shrunk by 15.6% in the last ten years. Our population dropped from 8662 to 7310. We are the fastest disappearing county in Iowa. We won that honor once before. Only seven Iowa counties have a smaller population. Meanwhile the state grew by 4%. The map shows the counties coded by rate of change with dark purple dropping by the greatest percentage and dark green increasing the greatest percentage.

Laurens Wins What Gamblers Lost

More than $15,000 in casino winnings were transferred to Laurens today when the Pocahontas County Foundation awarded its 2011 grants. The money went to four projects. An additional $65,000 went to other projects around the county.

The proposed Memory Lane park on South Third Street was granted $10,000. It was the second largest grant given this year, topped only by the $15,000 award to the Palmer fire station.

The Laurens Library will receive $4,000 to replace computers for patron use. The City of Laurens gets $2,000 for its work of digitizing the cemetery records.

Kids Korner Day Care will buy a Wii and two laptop computers with the $1650 it received today. Director Michelle Sandvig predicted the audience would be able to hear squeals of delight from the children when the computers arrive.

The Havelock fire department won $6,000 for new protective gear for firefighters. The Pocahontas Hospital's new wound center received $6,000. Libraries in Rolfe and Plover also received grants for computers. Among other recipients were Pocahontas Congregate Meals, the cities of Fonda, Pocahontas and Rolfe, Pocahontas Chamber of Commerce, the Pocahontas Community Band, and the Fonda Arts Center.

The Foundation grants were preceded by a speech from Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Bill Northey at the Rialto Theater in Pocahontas. The Foundation is a creation of the Pocahontas County Economic Development Commission. It has operated since 2006.

Prosperous New Year: Local Governments Have Little Debt

Laurens may be surrounded by a debt crisis--from Wall Street to California, from Athens to Washington, D.C.--but local governments are in excellent shape.

Pocahontas County carries no debt whatsoever.

The city of Laurens owes $2.6 million, about $2200 per resident. All the cities of Iowa average about $1500 in debt per resident of Iowa. (Unfortunately this figure assumes all Iowans live in a municipality.) Emmetsburg and Pocahontas each carry about $1800 per resident.

The Laurens-Marathon school district is paying off a debt of $2500 per student. Sioux Central's debt is similar. Pocahontas Area Community School owes nearly eight times as much per student as Laurens, due to the new construction nearing completion. Their enrollment will also increase if they combine with Palmer-Pomeroy in the near future. A vote will be held this winter.

Iowa Central Community College also appears on our property tax bills. ICCC owes $37 million. Its debt ranks exactly in the middle of Iowa's thirteen community college districts.

So that leaves personal credit card debt and mortgage or car payment debts. How is your new year looking?

The figures in this story are derived from data at the office of the State Treasurer.

Tom Shaw is State Representative

Laurens police chief Tom Shaw has been elected to the Iowa House of Representatives. Shaw rode to victory as part of a Republican sweep of Iowa election returns, spending more than $100,000 mostly on television attack ads against his school teacher opponent, Susan Bangert of Algona.

After midnight with one precinct still to report, the result was Shaw 66%, Bangert 34%.

Shaw's Campaign Flush with Mud & Money

Shaw Outspends Opponent 10-1

Laurens police chief Tom Shaw is attempting to bury his opponent under a mudslide in their race for the Iowa House. Documents released Friday show his negative television ads--which say nothing about Shaw himself--are costing nearly $90,000. They are being broadcast on Des Moines channels to the whole of Iowa.

Shaw's campaign has contributed only about five percent of the money needed to fund the ads. The rest is being paid by the Republican Party of Iowa. Shaw is a past president of the Pocahontas Republicans, but he began this race as an independent. Later he re-joined the party and won its primary election against an Algona physician. Many Laurens residents contributed to that effort, as reported by this website at the time.

Since then local contributions have been dwarfed by party funds and political action committees (PACs). In the last week checks of $1000 each were accepted from an Iowa bankers group and from Freedom First PAC, a creature of former Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty.

Shaw's advertising indicts his opponent for supposedly reducing Medicare to senior citizens. However his opponent, Algona educator Susan Bangert, has not been a member of Congress. The seat for which she and Shaw are running has no control over Medicare.

Earlier printed campaign matter had featured Bangert's photo over the phrase "Bad for Iowa". In the summer a flier insinuated that Bangert had voted to ban the flag from schools, an impossibility for someone who has not held office.

By contrast the Bangert campaign has been funded largely by individuals. There has been no net financial help from the Iowa Democratic Party. Bangert's two mailings have been straight forward with no false charges. Her campaign has cost about one tenth as much as the Republican campaign, according to the published reports both campaigns file with the state.

This race has received considerable coverage by various websites and the Des Moines Register. For a while it appeared to be the most competitive legislative race with so little spending. That changed this week with the big purchase of TV time for Shaw.

Update: BleedingHeartland says "In terms of hyperbole and deception, nothing tops a new commercial Republicans are running against Democratic candidate Susan Bangert in the open House district 8 race."

POET Ethanol Plant Powered by New Federal Subsidy

Late this fall bales of corn stover will pass by Laurens on their way to become cellulosic ethanol at the POET plant southeast of Emmetsburg. The bales will have come all the way from Carroll. Eighty-five farmers have signed four year contracts to provide the bales. Most are within thirty-five miles of Emmetsburg.

POET held a kick-off celebration on site Monday. Governor Culver spoke to the crowd of about one hundred. Researchers from Iowa State and Idaho National Laboratory discussed positive findings that support the dream of cellulosic ethanol.

But what really makes it happen is a new federal subsidy tucked into the 2008 farm bill called the biofuels crop assistance program. It pays $45/ton to farmers who supply corn stover for ethanol. With that incentive POET had no trouble finding a supply of stover for this fall. Some 56,000 acres are under contract.

Without the subsidy the cost of baling and hauling the stover and the cost of replacing the fertility that is removed from the field would eat up the full payment farmer's could command from an ethanol plant. No subsidy, no ethanol.

The POET plant expects to need six times as much stover in a few years. New opportunities to supply the plant may be available next fall.

For this year the plant prefers large square bales. Balers from Kansas and elsewhere are expected to help in this area this fall, according to Aaron Bloom of Albert City, a financial consultant with Ag Performance of Buffalo Center, Iowa.

POET has abandoned earlier plans to use corn cobs. They were unable to convince farmers to slow harvest and separate the cobs. Now they plan to buy "whatever comes out the back of the combine." Corn stalks are not as desirable as the leaf, husk, and cob mixture that can be wind-rowed by the combine and baled without additional chopping or raking. An eight row corn head is said to work perfectly. About one ton of desirable stover can be harvested from one acre of corn in this manner.